


Works in Progress

by Werepirechick



Category: Tales of Arcadia (Cartoons), Trollhunters - Daniel Kraus & Guillermo del Toro
Genre: Also Poly, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Family Loss, Friendship/Love, Healing, Hospitalization, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Multi, Polyamory, Recovery, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Harm, Self-Worth Issues, Suicide Attempt, Terrible Hospital Food, Therapy, Weight Issues, aka everything hurts but its getting easier, and things get better from there, basically a fic where three kids with a lot of depression and sad feelings get together, no magic!! just the magic of FRIENDSHIP!!, take a guess who owns which of those troubles, the fic affectionately nicknamed the Group Therapy AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-16
Updated: 2019-02-16
Packaged: 2019-10-29 13:05:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17808503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Werepirechick/pseuds/Werepirechick
Summary: Toby wears long sleeves to cover his arms, layered by large sweaters to hide himself and his body, and skips meals on regular. Claire has bloodshot eyes and black rings beneath them, a nasty habit of looking for trouble, and keeps her headphones on all night to drown out the quiet of her home. Jim never gives himself even a moment to rest, or shows his true feelings about anything, and quite literally would rather die than be a burden to others.(Three teenagers meet, one by one, in a hospital.)





	Works in Progress

**Author's Note:**

> hey hey HEY
> 
> i've been sitting on this au for a long ass time and i'm finally at the point where it can be posted!! in two parts, anyway. this is part one. enjoy part one and share my multitude of feelings for these kids.
> 
> also: this is an au within an au where jim lives on the other side of town and didn't live near toby or go to the same schools as him. they instead all meet as teens and build friendships from there <3

_“So what’re we doing today?”_

That’s what Toby asked about a half hour ago. He regrets asking it, now.

“This is a terrible idea,” he states, watching Jim haul himself up over the chain-link fence that’s covered with _No Trespassing_ signs.

“You don’t have to come,” Jim says cheerily, dropping to the ground on the other side.

Toby gives his friend a flat look. Obviously, even if it’s a _very_ terrible idea, Toby is coming along. He refuses to get left behind no matter how stupid the (mis)adventure. Still, climbing over the fence of a condemned and half-demolished construction site? To goof around inside a dilapidated building in the process of meeting its end?

Toby turns to his other friend, giving a slightly pleading look. “Please tell me you agree that this is a bad idea?”

Claire shrugs. “It’s not like I have anywhere else to be tonight,” she says, cracking her knuckles, “and if it pisses off my mom, I’m all for it.” She backs up and takes a running leap at the fence- the metal web rattling as she hits it, climbing up it quick as a whip despite her chunky Doc Martens. When Claire drops onto the ground on the other side, Jim gives her a high-five.

They aim excited grins at Toby, motioning for him to follow. Toby glances at the building they’re about to break into, then back to them, and then sighs loudly.

“We’re all gonna get tetanus,” he gripes, grabbing the cold chains and pulling himself up.

 

-/-

 

Jim meets Claire the third time he went in for an official appointment.

“That’s not gonna work,” says a voice behind him, and Jim starts a little, absorbed in his frustrated thoughts with the unresponsive machine. He turns and meets the eyes of a girl with big headphones on her head, and a slightly too large leather jacket that hangs off her shoulders. The skull on her shirt is biting down on a band name so stylized Jim can’t even read it, and it looks about as happy as the girl does.

“I-” he starts.

“Can’t hear you,” the girl says, cutting him off. “And I’m not pausing my music, either.”

“Uh…”

“Move over so I can show you how to get a drink.”

Jim, accepting that this is just happening to him now, steps to the side. The headphones girl takes his place in front of the drink vending machine, taking something shiny out of her pocket. Jim’s eyebrows shoot up as the girl proceeds to stick the barbs of metal into the lock on the side of the machine.

“You- oh my god,” he says, stunned as she pops the door of the machine and pushes it outwards. Jim’s view is blocked as she does that, and doesn’t have time to respond before she’s closing it again.

He nearly drops the can of pop she tosses at him, the cold container burning his fingers a little. The girl holds her own can under her arm, holding the vending machine door closed with her knee as she stabs the lock with her picks again, sealing it up once more.

Jim thinks he should probably inform the desk clerk down the hall that someone has been stealing from their machines. Maybe security. Instead of a scolding, though, what comes out of his mouth is a curious, “Where did you learn to do that?”

“Still can’t hear you,” says headphones girl, slightly bloodshot eyes giving him an ‘ _are you stupid’_ look. She snaps the tab of her can and takes a swig, turning and walking away without another word. Jim watches her go; headphones girl disappearing down a corridor of the hospital wing they’re in. He glances down at his stolen-gifted can of pop.

It’s a coke.

“Dammnit,” he mutters to himself, alone in the hallway. “I wanted sprite.”

 

-/-

 

“I love how much dead space this is,” Claire announces, hands on her hips as she surveys the interior of the building. The roof is half gone, the floors are creaky and covered in dust, and there are clear signs of taggers and animals getting inside through the gaping hole where the lobby used to be.

“Dead space?” Jim questions from across the room. He’s poking through a pile of broken furniture with a table leg, looking for something or other.

“Yeah. Dead space. This was living, breathing earth at one point, home to god only knows how many creatures- and then it got torn up, paved over, and then built on top of with a motel no one ever stayed at. And now it’s not even that. It’s just a bunch of wasted, dead space that no one can live in anymore.”

“The rats seem to be doing alright,” Toby says, staring at a decaying rat corpse beside the front desk. “Well… except that guy.”

“I dare you to touch it,” Claire says.

“What? No, ew, Claire. Why.”

“Because it’d be entertaining to see what comes crawling out.”

“Okay, so you might have been able to persuade me to touch it before you said that, but now it’s just no.”

“Chicken.”

“Do it _yourself_ if you want someone to fondle the dead rat so bad!”

“I indulged for the first time in three months and did my nails last night. Hell no. Be the gentleman and touch the rat.”

“How about no one touches the rat?” Jim speaks up, dropping his table leg back onto the pile. Claire and Toby exchange a glance, silently communicating.

Claire grins. Toby rolls his eyes. 

“Hey, _Jim…?”_

If there’s one thing Claire knows she can do, it’s talk Jim into things. Toby curses both of them regularly for being able to do that to each other.

Jim not only touches the rat, but he _picks it up_ with his bare hand. He poses with it while Claire laughs and snaps pictures to send to their short list of friends. Toby keeps trying to deny he thinks this isn’t funny up until Jim imitates the ‘ _New York freakin city baby’_ meme. That’s his breaking point.

Claire ignores the text messages that pop up on her phone screen as they take pictures. She refuses to answer them or the persons ending them. Being out here? It’s way better than showing up for her mom’s umpteenth ‘neighborhood relations encouragement’ or whatever party. Claire hates watching her mom and dad pretend that they’re all fine and happy and that the room just down the hall from hers isn’t painfully empty.

So. She’s here, in a filthy, condemned motel, running on three hours of sleep and something vaguely like happiness, so long as she’s with Jim and Toby.

“How much would I have to pay you to make you kiss it?”

“Claire, I love you, but no.”

“Oh thank god,” Toby says under his breath. Claire sticks her tongue out at both of them.

 

-/-

 

Toby is sitting on a pleather couch the first time he meets Jim.

It’s three in the morning. His nana is talking quick and quiet with the nurse at the desk, about what options they have right now. He’ll be brought into a room pretty soon, seeing as the waiting room is fairly dead.

Toby scrubs at his eyes, exhausted and miserable and so angry at himself for doing this to his nana. If he’d held it together overnight, he could have at least postponed this until after sunrise.

“Tissue?”

Toby drops his hands from his face, surprised that anyone would approach him right now. There’s a boy about his age standing in front of him, holding a tissue box. The boy has a blue zip up hoodie on, and black hair mussed on one side like he’d been sleeping. His tired eyes tell that the sleep wasn’t a long one.

“…Thanks,” Toby says belatedly, taking a tissue from the box. The other boy nods, and then tries to hand the whole thing over as soon as Toby’s blown his nose.

“Here. You can just keep it; I can get as many as I want.”

“Oh- I- I’m fine, I don’t-”

“It’s better than having to sanitize yourself after this, trust me. The last thing you wanna be doing in a hospital is touching your face with your hands.”

Toby ends up taking the tissues. The boy waves a little goodbye as he wanders off again, slippered feet shuffling on the linoleum.

Toby doesn’t ask the boy’s name that first night, or why he’s there in the hospital, and Jim doesn’t ask about the badly wrapped gauze around Toby’s left wrist.

 

-/-

 

“Okay, who wants to go first?” Jim asks, standing in front of a halfway rotted bed.

Claire immediately replies with, “A lover’s quarrel that took them all over town while they fought, and ended in horrible makeup and then breakup sex.”

“Toby?”

Toby scratches the side of his face, saying, “I’m gonna go with the scenario of… a business man recently kicked out by his business husband, traded in for the cute caddy at their golf club.”

Jim laughs at both stories. “Alright, then I’ll say the last persons to sleep here was a family of raccoons.”

Claire scoffs. “Well, _obviously,”_ she exclaims, gesturing at the torn up center of the mattress, shredded by determined little claws. “Don’t cop out like that, give us a good one.”

“Yeah, Jim,” Toby chimes in. “Don’t be a lameass.”

Jim huffs, but is good-natured about the demands. He likes Toby and Claire for their occasional bossiness, likes that they’re comfortable enough with him and each other they’ll cut loose like this. Claire is a completely different person when she has to perform for her family’s friends and associates. Toby doesn’t attempt at all to make himself heard with other people. And Jim…

For Jim, when he’s with them, the smile on his face and the emotion he puts in his words is all sincere.

“Fine, fine. I say that the last _human_ persons to sleep on this bed… was a seduced motel custodian and a failed infomercial actress trying to drink away her woes.”

_“Nice,”_ Toby and Claire chorus. Jim grins and jokes about them all trying out the ruined bed for themselves. Toby replies that if he’s survived nearly stepping on a nail in the floor, tripping and almost landing on exposed rebar, and avoided a falling door whose hinges gave out the second he touched it- he knows, just _knows_ the second he touches the bed, its rusted through springs will give him tetanus.

Claire calls him a chicken a second time and Toby threatens to use one of the disgusting pillows on her. Jim puts his arms around their shoulders before any real violence can happen and just smiles, smiles, and smiles.

 

-/-

 

Claire meets Jim (again) in an awkward moment.

It’s bad enough she can barely keep her own emotions under control most days. Forget her even _trying_ to console someone else.

She’s wandering the hospital corridors again that day, having texted her dad that he didn’t need to pick her up, she’d bus home. Claire turns her phone off before she can see the reply. She knows she promised to come home right away after appointment. She doesn’t care if she gets grounded- she’ll just sneak out if she really needs to.

But, she doesn’t need to. Claire stopped going out with her friends months ago. She barely can convince herself to make it to school and back most days, the nagging thoughts of _it’s pointless, this doesn’t matter, how can any of this matter to anyone when he’s still MISSING-?_

She’s got her headphones on and blasting the volume too loud, the moment she realizes the enclosed bridge between buildings isn’t empty. Claire stutters and stops, staring at the boy she’d given a can of pop to about a week ago.

Said boy is standing in front of the windows that make up the walls of the bridge, tears streaming down his face.

Claire is frozen, not sure if it would be ruder to turn around and run or just keep her head down and finish crossing the bridge. She’s too late to make a decision, because the boy whips his eyes to her the second she shifts her weight of her stance.

His eyes are really blue, especially in the natural light of day.

He flushes, quickly rubbing his face. Claire can’t hear whatever she thinks he’s saying, the tempo of her music overwhelming her hearing and keeping the world at bay.

For some reason, she reaches to her headphones and presses pause. They slide down her head and hang around her neck, leaving her standing in a world that’s too quiet… except for the sniffling boy just a few paces away.

“-so, yeah, don’t mind me,” he’s saying, head ducked. He drops his hands from his face and looks up again, a friendly smile plastered onto his face. “I’m fine. Sorry I got in the way.”

Claire stares at him, wondering if her own fake smiles look as pained as his does.

She wants to keep walking. She doesn’t want to acknowledge someone else’s pain. She can’t handle any more than her own, scarcely holding on some nights as the house creaks and her open window lets in a chill and the room down the hall is so, so silent-

“Are you hungry?” she asks, grabbing the first thought to pass through her mind. The boy blinks, not answering. Claire figures she’s already made a stupid choice saying that aloud, but she can’t quite care. “Doesn’t matter, actually. You’re coming to the cafeteria and we’re both gonna eat shitty hospital food instead of wandering the hallway aimlessly. Okay?”

“…I guess?” the boy replies a beat later.

Claire jerks a nod. Some part of her from over a year ago is horrendously embarrassed by what she’s doing. All the parts of her from then on don’t give a shit.

The boy follows her as she walks past him, obedient and watching. Claire’s untamed bangs fall in her face and she blows the out of the way, somewhat regretting not brushing her hair this morning. The daylight of the window bridge is replaced by hospital fluorescents as they go along.

“I’m Claire,” she says after about a half a hall’s walk.

“I know,” replies the boy. At her confused glance, he smiles sheepishly. “My mom works here. I overhear things in the staffroom sometimes.”

Claire scoffs. “Of course people would gossip about the mayor’s kid being fucked in the head.”

“Aw, no, nobody said that.”

“They thought it. That’s what everyone thinks.”

“It’s not what I think.”

Claire doesn’t respond to Jim for the rest of the trip to the cafeteria. He doesn’t sound pitying, or insincere. It’s a drastic change she’s not sure how to handle right now.

 

-/-

 

“Ten bucks says this gives out under me immediately,” Toby announces, giving the sagging floor a dubious look.

“Ten bucks says you make it across fine,” Claire challenges.

“And zero bucks says you can just go around,” Jim points out.

“Where’s the fun in that, Jim? I did it, you did it-”

“Yeah,” Toby interrupts, rolling his eyes, “and both of you combined are about how much _I_ weigh, miss ‘I skipped breakfast all week because I slept through it’.”

Claire rolls her eyes in return. “Says the guy who didn’t eat for days, just a month ago.”

“I ate Jim’s smoothies,” Toby defends.

“ _Barely.”_

“You missed dinner twice the past two days!”

“You ‘missed’ Jim’s delivery of smoothies almost four times!”

“ _Guys,”_ Jim says loudly, crossing his arms, “let’s all be counterproductive to our mutual recoveries _after_ we’re in the next half of the building?”

Toby groans, but lets the matter go. There’s no point in fighting about it anyway- it’s just an endless cycle of him and Claire speaking each other’s internal criticisms to themselves. It technically counts as venting, technically counts as self-harm without actually hurting themselves. Jim will let them go on about it only sometimes, when they _really_ need a vent day.

Jim doesn’t vent. He hardly ever talks about any of his problems. They have to drag them out of him by force, one by one. For someone who wears his heart on his sleeve, offering kindness to just about anyone who needs it, Jim is a very secretive person.

Maybe Toby will get something out of his friend today. Maybe between him and Claire and this horrible, mildly terrifying illegal endeavour- they’ll get Jim to talk, even just a little.

But for that to happen, Toby has to get across the sagging floor of the second story hallway they’re in.

He edges around the sides of the dip in the floor, ignoring Claire’s disappointed boos. He flips her off for it.

 

-/-

 

Jim properly meets Toby in the presence of mutual friends.

It’s while Jim’s staring at his hands after an appointment, wondering to himself thoughts of worthiness and worthlessness. He should have left right away afterwards, so he wasn’t in the way, but- Blinky is easy to be around. The man doesn’t treat him like glass, usually, and is just a genuinely kind person.

Jim can’t help that he stays lying on the physiotherapy room’s couch a while longer, comfortable on old cushions and half-listening to the radio Blinky has playing, as well as the brief phone conversation he has with his partner. It’s only when a new voice enters the ambience of the room that Jim comes out of his wandering daze.

Jim sits up a little too quickly, shoving down his jacket sleeves. He meets the somewhat startled eyes of a newcomer- one he’s met before, actually.

“Oh,” Jim says, just as the other boy goes, “ _Ah!”_

_“It’s you,”_ they both say in unison.

Blinky looks between the two of them, smiling despite his confusion. “I take it you two have met before?”

“Uh, yeah,” says the other boy, his cheeks flushing as he mutters, “that’s one thing to call it.”

Jim feels bad instantly, seeing that clear discomfort. His appointment was over almost fifteen minutes ago; it was selfish of him to use up Blinky’s time like that when he _knew_ Blinky’s newest patient was coming today.

“Well,” says Blinky cheerfully, “that is certainly an odd coincidence. What are the chances?”

“Higher than we’d have thought, I guess,” Jim manages to joke, standing from the couch and grabbing his backpack beside it. “I’ll get out of your hair; sorry for overstaying.”

“Oh- no, no I’m early,” says the other boy quickly. “I, uh, didn’t want to get lost and end up late, so… yeah. You don’t have to leave yet if you were still-”

“My session ended already,” Jim reassures him, stopping next to his friend/physiotherapist and the other boy. Jim smiles for their sake’s, offering comfort to cover his self-recriminations. “I’m Jim, by the way. I’m… I’m glad you’re alright.”

For a moment, Jim worries he’s overstepped himself, subtly referencing the circumstances they originally met under. He tries, but sometimes he just can’t find the point where people get uncomfortable with him expressing concern towards them.

But, his fears are waved away as the other boy responds by putting out a hand, after a brief pause. “I’m Toby,” he says, and Jim notes the slightest hint of crescent lines under the edge of Toby’s long sleeves. Toby’s other arm, the one that’d been injured, remains by his side.

Jim takes Toby’s hand.

“It’s nice to meet you, Toby.”

Jim is rewarded with a small smile; nervous, unsure. Without really realizing it, Jim’s own smile becomes sincere for a brief second.

 

-/-

 

Claire rolls her shoulders, and pulls out her lock picks.

“I still cannot believe your family let you learn how to do this,” Toby comments over her shoulder.

“They didn’t,” Claire replies.

“Ah. Yeah, that makes more sense.”

“Did I ever tell you about how she breaks into vending machines?”

“Oh my god. No. Claire, I thought you just did that to our houses when we forgot to leave the door open.”

“Jim, stop tattling on me,” Claire scolds him, twisting her picks inside the flimsy lock and popping it open. She grins and turns the knob. “Voila. You can applaud me now.”

“Bravo,” Jim says, clapping along with Toby.

“Another stunning breaking and entering by Miss Nuñez,” Toby says with only slight sarcasm.

“I try,” Claire says loftily, stowing one of the best internet purchases she ever made in her pocket again. She pushes the door open the rest of the way, and they waltz into what _was_ the nicest suite in the motel. The mattress and comforter are definitely molding and full of vermin, and the curtains are more dust than fabric, but there’s always a chance for treasure among the trash.

Which, as Claire sticks her head into the ensuite bathroom with her phone light on, she spots exactly what she was hoping for.

“Score!” she exclaims, and nabs the collection of tiny shampoos on the counter.

“No way,” Toby says, dropping the molding bible he’s fished out of a side table.

“Dibs on anything fruity,” Jim says quickly, hurrying over to Claire. She laughs and hands him a little bar of soap, which isn’t exactly fruity, but still smells nice. He takes the soap solemnly, the spark of humor Claire loves to see, but rarely does, dancing in his eyes.

“Which d’you need more,” Claire asks Toby, holding out the remaining soaps. “Conditioner or shampoo?”

“You have thicker hair than me, take the conditioner,” Toby says reasonably, and they split the bottles without issue.

“Can soap expire?” Jim asks, peering at the wrapper of his little soap bar.

“I… don’t know?” Claire offers unhelpfully.

“Google it,” Toby says as all three of them pull out their phones. “Also, someone look up how much shit a bunch of minors can get in for trespassing, breaking and entering, larceny, and property damage.”

“It was already like that when I found it!” Claire protests.

“You _literally_ shouted ‘ _oh shit I broke a window’_ , right after you threw a digital alarm clock _through_ said window.”

Note for future urban exploration: _don’t_ swing digital alarm clocks by their cord, because the cord will probably snap.

“You can’t prove that.”

“I was witness, actually, so yeah he could.”

“ _Jim.”_

“And I was witness, too, so that’s two against one.”

“Guess I’ll have to make sure you both stay quiet, huh?”

“Oh, no, Claire _no-”_

Claire makes a grab for Toby, who jumps away with a laugh- she changes targets and tries to grab Jim instead, who is even faster than Toby and makes for the other side of the room. They send up a cloud of dust as Toby stumbles into a curtain, tripping on the dragging fabric and pulling the whole rod off the wall. Claire howls with laughter as it clatters loudly and filthily to the carpet, dumping half its dust on Toby as it does.

Her friend glares at her, shoving his little shampoo bottle into his pocket and wiping a hand down his face. “Oh. Oh, you are going to _pay_ for that!”

Claire shrieks and reverses as Toby tries to tackle her, evading the dirty hug he’s definitely aiming to give her. Claire runs out of the suite, Toby in pursuit, and Jim laughing all the way down the hall as he keeps up with them.

Claire nearly trips on uneven carpet and swings around a corner to race down creaky steps, footsteps thundering along with her friends’, lungs breathless and cheeks hurting from her smile.

She feels whole, right now. She feels unburdened so long as she’s racing full tilt through this abandoned ruin of a business, her two best friends right behind her every step of the way. If she could, she’d extend this afternoon until the end of time, and never go back to her own house’s haunted halls ever again.

 

-/-

 

Toby meets Claire when she probably least wanted that to happen. It happened anyway.

Life isn’t kind; it takes and hurts and makes you wonder why you keep going at all. Toby asks himself the latter question a lot. He finds it both comforting and saddening that Jim also asks himself that question, and that Claire is intensely familiar with the former two items.

Toby is with Jim after his last physiotherapy appointment- he’s in the clear, apparently. Despite needing serious stitches this time, he didn’t cut deeply enough to damage his tendons or nerves. Jim had been standing just outside the room when Toby came out; talking with the very, very large man Dr. Galadrigal is married to.

(Aarghaumont is a scarred, deep voiced gentle giant. _“Call me Arrrgh,”_ he’d said when they first met, offering a handshake that’d been gentle as a butterfly alighting on your skin.)

Toby knows Jim is in the hospital far too often for it to be normal. He knows there’s a reason why Jim frequents the mental health wings of the hospital. He knows there’s a reason why Jim is always wearing covering clothing and watches the world with tired eyes. Toby knows all those things and doesn’t know how to approach them yet- they’ve only been friends a short time, it’s probably none of his business.

The scene they accidentally come across isn’t one Toby knows how to approach, _or_ any of their business, either. They end up witness to it anyway.

“-no, _no_ \- I am sick to _death_ of pretending everything is just fucking _fine-!”_

“Claire Maria Nuñez you _watch your language,_ we are in a _public place_ young lady and-”

“And I don’t _give a shit, mom!”_

There are two people in the hallway back from the therapy wing, blocking all traffic as they have an obviously very personal fight. One is the _mayor_ of Arcadia, and the other is the _mayor’s daughter._

Who Toby happens to share a handful of classes with at his high school, actually. Until she’d mostly stopped coming to school, anyway.

Toby has a hand on Jim’s sleeve without consciously grabbing it, tugging his friend away from the confrontation they _really_ shouldn’t be watching go down. Jim doesn’t move, eyes locked on the mayor’s daughter.

“All you ever care about is our fucking family image!” Claire yells, face blotchy and eyes furious. “Even- even after they took Enrique all you did was _pretend._ Pretend that we’re fine when he’s _gone!_ Don’t fucking tell me to watch my language when you’re not even acknowledging that your own _son_ was kidnapped-”

“ _I acknowledged it!”_ the mayor bellows over her daughter’s words. Claire’s mouth snaps shut, and her mother continues, words hissing and hoarse. “I acknowledged it, I grieved, I did _everything_ I could to bring my baby boy home, Claire. But I can’t just _stop_ because Enrique is gone! I have a job, I have to keep paying bills, I have to keep living and so do you.”

Claire stares at her mother with eyes like fire and despair. She’s wordless for a few seconds, and then she spits, “Do you even _hear yourself?”_

Her mother sighs, eyes darting to the nurses, security, and other people watching their fight go down. No one has interrupted yet, probably because Mrs. Nuñez is the _mayor,_ and nobody in their right mind would want to get involved with this family drama.

“Claire, please,” her mother says in a tight tone. “You’re embarrassing us both.”

Toby sees something visibly snap in Claire.

“You- _I’m-”_ Claire is so angry she’s struggling for words. She lets out a shriek, tears leaking from her eyes. “ _For once in your life could you actually care about something other than your fucking public image?!”_

“Claire-”

“Shut up! _SHUT UP!”_ Claire screams.

“You need to calm _down_ , Claire, or so help me-”

“Or what? Or _what?!_ You’ll ground me? Take away my phone? I don’t fucking _care!_ I don’t care and you don’t really care- you’re just doing it for _appearance’s sake!”_

“ _Claire-”_

“You wish it’d been me!” Claire accuses viciously, tears rolling down her face. “You wish it’d been _me,_ I _know you do!_ You wish it’d been me who disappeared so- so you could have your picture perfect little family and I wouldn’t be here to fuck it up anymore!”

Her mother’s frustrated expression breaks into something a lot more vulnerable. “Oh, Claire, Claire _no_ , I don’t- _Claire!_ ”

Toby drags Jim back to be against the wall as Claire goes running past. Her heavy boots echo in the hallway, but are gone too fast for anyone to react. Her mother is left standing where they’d been fighting, a stricken look on her face.

Toby looks away. It’s not his life, it’s not his problem. He can’t deal with anyone else’s issues but his own, right now. Well, except for maybe-

“Jim? Jim, hey, wait- Jim no she probably wants to be alone-”

Toby is ignored. He sighs and follows his friend as Jim marches down the hall. It’s not like Toby had anywhere to be this afternoon, anyway.

 

-/-

 

“We should’ve brought snacks,” Jim says, lying flat on his back and staring at the ceiling. It’s more water damage than ceiling anymore, the way brown stains cover it nearly corner to corner.

“ _Yes._ Why didn’t we?” Toby says, and, ah, that’s a tone of snark incoming. “Oh wait. Because neither of you put any planning into this beyond ‘break in’ and ‘not getting arrested’.”

“I think the not getting arrested part is pretty important,” Claire protests.

“So’s sustenance and clean water.”

“Aren’t you the one who’s always dieting?”

“Aren’t you the one who’s always telling me to actually eat?”

“No, that’s Jim.”

“That’s me,” Jim says, waving a hand lazily. He’ll just coax the two of them back to his house after this, that way everyone gets a decent and healthy meal. Otherwise, Claire might just lock herself in her room without dinner, and Toby will either eat what he’s trying to avoid eating, or he’ll stare at his cupboards until he talks himself out of making a meal.

“I’ll bring veggie sticks next time,” Jim promises them both. Claire and Toby’s exclamations of gratitude are nice to hear- they reaffirm that Jim is welcome in his mother-henning of them.

Taking care of others is easy. It can be tiring, some days, but the sort of tiring that Jim doesn’t mind. He feels productive. Fulfilled. Like he’s contributing enough that he can be allowed to keep existing.

Claire and Toby will give him sad looks if he says that aloud, though, so Jim keeps it to himself.

 

-/-

 

“Go away.”

“I will. After I know you’re okay.”

“Do I _look_ okay?”

“No. Which is why we aren’t leaving yet.”

Claire wipes her eyes, sniffling embarrassingly. She glares at Jim and the boy he brought with him, baleful and angry they’re seeing her like this.

Whatever. Claire is tired of pretenses anyway. This is how she is and she’s beyond giving a fuck if anyone knows that.

“How’d you even find me,” Claire mutters, shoving herself deeper into the shadows under her table-cave.

Jim gives her a kind smile, crawling deeper in and sitting a short distance from her; his friend hesitates for a moment, but follows and sits next to Jim.

“I basically grew up here,” Jim says. “I think I know more about its layout than most of the staff.”

“…Is anyone else gonna find us?”

“Unless someone’s suddenly hosting a fundraiser party or something, I doubt they’re gonna look in this particular storage room.”

Claire relaxes a little. That’s good. She can’t face her mom right now- or any other adult, for that matter. She just wants to curl up in a dark hole and never come out again.

She didn’t expect to have company in that dark hole, though.

Claire sniffles again, gives her cheeks a scrub with her palm, and glances at the unfamiliar face of their trio. “Who’s your friend?” she asks, tone flatter than she meant it to be.

Jim’s friend hunches on himself and looks very, very apologetic for being here. Jim pats the boy’s arm, saying something quiet and comforting.

“This is Toby,” Jim says to Claire. “We met a few weeks ago, around the same time I met you. I’ve actually been meaning to introduce you two if your appointments ever happened on the same day.”

Claire looks at Toby, re-evaluating him. So, he’s in the same boat and her and Jim, huh? Jim might be tight lipped about why he’s here so often, but Claire knows he’s like her in a way. Troubled, fucked up, a problem child- whatever you call it, they’re that.

“Hey. Sorry this is how we had to meet,” Claire says to Toby. “I’m Claire.”

“I know,” Toby says, fidgeting with his hands. “You, uh. You go to the same school as me. We have some classes together.”

Claire blinks, and then feels her cheeks heat a little. “Oh, uh. Sorry. Guess we never… talked.”

Toby shrugs. “It’s okay. I don’t have many friends, so it’s alright that you never noticed me. No one usually does.”

There’s a note in his tone that Claire latches onto. Loneliness, resignation... Claire has a few friends still, but they don’t connect anymore, not like how they used to. She feels the loneliness Toby’s tone shows on a daily basis.

“Then it’s nice to notice you, now,” Claire says, tentatively offering an opening in the walls she’s built up around herself.

Toby snorts and laughs. “I noticed you forever ago- I mean, everyone did- but yeah, same to you.”

It doesn’t sound bitter or upset; Toby’s words are teasing, actually. Friendly teasing. After being treated like a glass figurine, or a ticking time bomb, it’s a nice change. It’s the same kind of change Claire found in having lunch with Jim, that first time, and the handful of times afterwards.

Jim smiles between them, evidently very happy with himself for bringing them together. Then, he offers Claire a packet of tissues he produces from nowhere. Claire takes them, blows her nose, and lets the pleasant small talk Toby and Jim offer draw her from her pit of despair.

They don’t ask about why she and her mom were fighting. With how fast and far word spreads in Arcadia, they probably know plenty about her family’s situation already. But, they’re not dancing around the issue, either, which is such a foreign yet achingly normal thing that Claire almost doesn’t know what to do with it.

She doesn’t do anything with it, in the end, except let herself be led from the storage room to a messy staff room, where she’s handed a cup of blue jello, settled in a reasonably comfy chair, and invited to watch some TV with them before she texts her mom.

 

-/-

 

“ _Ow,_ fuck- see? _See?_ I told you guys we were gonna get tetanus!’

“It’s one cut, Toby.”

“ _It only takes one, Claire.”_

“I’ve got band-aids at home,” Jim says in a placating tone, hopping down after them. The chain-link fence rattles as he does, disturbing the quiet of the construction site.

Toby huffs and licks his cut finger, grimacing at the sting and its taste. It isn’t the most _hygienic_ solution, but it’s better than bleeding all over his sweater.

“So, we’re heading for your place, Jim?” Claire questions, spinning on her heel to walk backwards with them.

Jim smiles as they get to the street. “That would be the plan, yeah. How d’you guys feel about mixed veggies and leftover meatloaf?”

“Not fresh?” Toby asks, pretending to be disappointed. When Jim’s smile slips a little, anxious worry taking its place, Toby hurriedly says, “I’m joking, Jim! Everything you make tastes great, even if it’s leftovers.”

“I can make some fresh if you want, though,” Jim says, and fuck, now Toby feels like a crap friend. And after the nice afternoon they had together, too.

“You don’t need to, Jimbo, seriously.”

“But-”

“Jim, darling,” Claire says, wrapping a stern arm around Jim’s shoulders and pulling him flush. “Look us in the eye. We would eat literally _anything_ you make, no matter what it is or how many days it’s been in the fridge. Toby, get over here. We have to do a Jim Sandwich apparently.”

Toby obliges the order, marching over and taking his position against Jim’s other side. Jim protests faintly, but they both ignore him in favor of hugging the shit out of him. Toby squeezes Jim especially hard, trying to channel all his apologetic feelings into the gesture. He didn’t mean to make Jim upset. It was just a stupid joke and he’s sorry it was so tactless.

“You don’t have to fall over yourself to make us happy, Jim,” Toby says firmly. “We’ve been over that a hundred times or something.”

Jim ducks his head, mumbling, “I know, I know, I just…”

“‘Just’ nothing,” Claire says, pressing a kiss to his temple. “C’mon, let’s go eat already. We’ll even help you cook.”

“You don’t need to.”

“But we _want to,”_ Toby insists. And they totally do; cooking with Jim is one of the most common activities for their trio. It makes Jim happy, and makes Toby and Claire’s taste buds happy. A win-win.

“And I want to cook _for_ you guys,” Jim counters. “Please? I- I like doing it. I like cooking for you two. It’s not hard, and I really enjoy it, I promise.”

Toby and Claire don’t even have to glance at each other to share a mutual silent sigh. Sometimes, how _good_ Jim tries to be drives them a little crazy. Jim deserves to be happy, too; not just work himself to the bone making everyone else happy.

They’re still working on getting that through his skull, unfortunately. Like Toby and Jim are still working on getting it through to Claire that what happened to her brother isn’t her fault. Like Jim and Claire are still working on getting it through to Toby that he’s perfect the way he is, and thoughts that say otherwise are lies.

They’re all a work in progress.

But, not so much that they can’t pick up the mood again, stumbling along on the sidewalk still clinging to each other. They take up the whole walk side to side, which will definitely earn them some glares if they meet another person heading the opposite direction. It makes it even easier to giggle at the stupidest things as they go.

 

-/-

 

“Why’re you doing that?”

“Doing what?”

“ _That,”_ Jim says, pointing at Toby’s tray. “You were just talking about how excited you were for tater tots, and it looks like you barely got a full scoop of them.”

Toby’s cheeks turn a ruddy color and he looks away. “My eyes were bigger than my stomach, that’s all,” he says. “And I’m on a diet anyway, so… I probably shouldn’t be having them at all.”

Claire, sitting at the cafeteria table with them, has one eyebrow raised. Jim is frowning, because he’s noticed more and more how often Toby refuses to eat a full meal when they meet here.

“You need fat in your diet, Tobes,” Jim says carefully. “Humans need it as a part of our normal dietary requirements.” He glances at how the only other thing on Toby’s plate is a container of veggie slices. “You need protein, too. And dairy, and whole grains-”

“I had some _earlier,”_ Toby says, almost snapping as he does. Jim’s mouth shuts with a click, internally flinching away.

“…Okay, sorry.”

Toby still won’t look at him. The silence hangs over them, thick and uncomfortable.

“Bullshit,” Claire says suddenly. They both look at her, and find that she’s giving Toby a flat stare. “You didn’t eat anything before you came here, obviously.”

“I- yes I did!” Toby protests.

“Toby, you are a lot of things, but a master liar is not one of them. I’ve done hunger strikes before. I know what someone looks like when they aren’t eating.”

Jim’s stare at her becomes alarmed. “You- _what?”_

Claire waves him off. “They don’t last more than a day or two, and I haven’t done one in a while now. It’s no big deal.”

“Um, it kind of _is?”_

“Why’re _you_ dieting?” Toby asks her, tone sliding quickly towards anger. “You’re- you’re barely over a hundred pounds, I bet!”

“A hundred and twenty- three, actually. And it’s not dieting. That’s starving yourself. Guess you have two methods for self-harm, huh?”

“Hey- _hey!”_ Jim snaps, putting out his arms to push both of his friends back into their seats. He glares at them both. “We’re all gonna take a deep breath right now and chill out, okay? I don’t know what either of your problems are today, but I’m not letting you go at each other’s throats for it.”

“It’s nothing,” Claire says tetchily, shrugging off Jim’s hand. Toby does the same, but doesn’t say anything.

Jim stares at them both. He feels a little lost. And hurt. This was supposed to be a fun few hours together after and before one another’s appointments, not… _this,_ with Claire and Toby looking any direction but at each other.

“…Guys, please.” Jim gives his friends a distressed look. “Tell me what’s going on with you? You’ve both been off today. I won’t tell anyone, or- or even say anything about whatever it is. I just wanna make sure you’re both okay.”

There’s a long pause, during which Jim’s shoulders slump and his hope shrinks. Maybe it’s too soon. They’ve only been friends all together for roughly a week and a half. Maybe he’s overstepping his boundaries by asking for details.

Then, Claire mutters something, rubbing her face roughly.

“What?”

“…They… they declared Enri-” Claire stops, mouth twisting as she scrubs harder at her eyes. It smears the eyeliner she’d put on today, worsening the dark circles she already had. “They declared his case cold, yesterday,” Claire says in a hushed voice. “I only found out because I answered the phone before my parents could.”

“Oh, Claire…” Jim reaches out to her, and though it takes a moment, she grasps his hand back. “I’m so sorry,” he says sincerely, squeezing her hand. “They’ll find a new lead soon, I’m sure.”

Claire snorts, running a hand through her hair and tangling its thick strands. “You’re no good at lying either, Jim,” she says, wryly and sadly.

“Claire-”

“It’s fine, Jim. I can’t change facts, and I shouldn’t have taken my shit mood out on you two.”

Jim keeps hold of Claire’s hand; willing how much sympathy he has for her situation to reach through her misery. There’s only so much he can do, though, and that makes Jim upset with himself and the world. No one should have to go through the pain Claire is going through.

Toby mumbles something, drawing both of their attentions.

“Pardon?” Claire asks.

“I- it’s stupid, never mind,” Toby says quickly, cheeks darkening again.

“Hey, no, it’s not stupid if it’s upsetting you,” Jim says, reaching for Toby’s hand as well. A childish part of him insists that if he can hold onto them tightly enough, their cracks and fissures will mend. Jim can’t fix himself, or his mom, but maybe- maybe he can help his friends. Even just a little.

Which is why he waits for Toby to respond truthfully, even as his friend rambles nonsense to try and derail the conversation. It keeps going despite Jim’s gentle prompts to slow down, and it’s only when Claire bluntly says, “I talked about my personal drama, now it’s your turn,” that Toby stops.

“Fine, _fine!”_ Toby finally exclaims. His face is red as anything and he looks utterly dejected. “I- this morning, my-”

“What happened?” Jim asks, giving another gentle prompt.

Toby yanks his hand away from Jim’s and covers his face, muffled words coming out in a rush as he says, “ _Another pair of my fucking pants don’t fit anymore.”_

And then he starts crying.

Claire swears under her breath, a panicked expression flitting across her face. Jim releases her hand and stands immediately, coming around the table and wrapping his arms around Toby.

“It’s okay,” Jim says, holding his friend as Toby tries to fight back his tears. “We’ll get new pants. They probably shrank in the wash, Tobes. You have plenty others, it’s okay, I promise it’s okay…”

Claire’s arms wrap around Toby, too, no more than a minute later. Awkward but purposeful in intent. Toby mumbles about being sorry, that it’s a stupid thing to be upset about, he didn’t mean to ruin their lunch-

They reassure him that nothing’s ruined. It’s fine. They’ll even go shopping with him, soon as Claire’s appointment is done. And there’s a no-calorie smoothie option in the mall, Claire tells them. She knows someone who works there; she’ll get them a discount.

Toby sniffles and says thank you several times over. Jim offers their napkins as tissues, and despite how she’d initially kept herself contained when they spent time together, Claire keeps hugging Toby around the shoulders. Her expression is equal parts sympathetic and very intense.

Any stares they attract are pointedly ignored for the duration it takes for Toby to calm back down.

 

-/-

 

Claire likes Jim’s house. It’s neat and tidy, but in a way that feels like you’re expecting company at any moment, scared of being judged for even the slightest thing out of place. Though it’s just the three of them right now, it doesn’t feel empty at all.

It feels comfortable and well-cared for, no doubt because of Jim’s dedication.

While a knife chops away against a cutting board in the other room, fingers carefully tangle in her hair. Claire didn’t sleep much last night, and that insomnia is starting to catch up with her. Her drowsiness led to Jim banishing her from the kitchen, sentenced to resting on the couch. The company that was banished along with her is a bonus.

Claire’s toes have wormed their way under the pillows on the couch, compensating for the lack of blanket. She doesn’t really need it anyway, since the seasonal change to summer has started to really pick up, and the person sitting on the couch with her is more than enough to keep her warm.

Opening her eyes briefly, Claire looks up at Toby. He’s staring off into space, fingers carding through her hair absently. The touch is tender, gently tugging out little knots here and there. With the top of her head against Toby’s thigh, and just the quiet noise of dinner being made in the background, the casual intimacy of the situation has lulled Claire more than halfway into a nap.

If she could take the calmness of this moment with her, she would. But inevitably, every night, she has to go home and try to sleep through a silence that’s just about deafening. Even when she takes sleeping pills, all she gets is weird dreams, often turning to nightmares, which leave her about as rested as a night without sleep would.

If there were a way to prolong the time she spends with Jim and Toby… if she could avoid the gaps between feeling alright and feeling like her own self-loathing is strangling her…

“Hey… Toby?”

“Hm?”

“Would it be weird to ask a weird question?”

“Uh… ‘s kinda in the name that it would be?”

Claire smiles wanly, chuckling along with him. “Fair point, but… still. Can I?”

He raises an eyebrow, his hands stilling in her hair. “Sure. Something bothering you?”

“Not… exactly.” Claire shifts a little, raising an arm over her head to brush her fingers against Toby’s chin. When he takes his hand from her hair to lace their fingers together, Claire smiles as softly as he is.

“I was just wondering…” she says quietly, “what kind of plans do you have for moving out, after high school?”

**Author's Note:**

> hmu on my [discord](https://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fdiscord.gg%2FPBqStWv&t=MzkxZDhlYTE4MzIwMjg2MjRkODQxZDEzMmI0NzZmMWE0ZmI2YjJlNCxaaTNMZXNvZw%3D%3D&b=t%3AF-wa90Tij4jaMp7hiAUjeg&p=https%3A%2F%2Fonthespectrumwriting.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F180852645418%2Fspectrum-discord&m=1) if you wanna chat about my fics & this fic, or find my [ToA tumblr](https://chillahead-bridge.tumblr.com/) and yell (politely) in my ask box there.


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